Why this matters

Resident doctors provide expert, compassionate care across a wide range of services every day. And as the NHS changes to meet the needs of our population, training requirements for our staff must evolve and change too.

It is essential that training for resident doctors is high quality, fit for the modern NHS, and provides doctors with the skills they need to meet the evolving needs of our patients.

Resident doctors who currently work in the NHS have made it clear that they have concerns and frustrations with their training experience. We are also aware of the needs of the increasing numbers of doctors in locally employed posts in NHS trusts and the specialty and specialist workforce. As the people responsible for training doctors, there is much more the NHS and our partners can do collectively to improve their learning and working experience in the NHS.

We are committed to listening, addressing concerns, and improving the training pathway for the medical workforce and the benefit of NHS services and patients.

By listening to everyone’s views we can effectively plan to:

• improve the working lives of resident doctors
• enhance career progression and flexibility
• support resident doctors in delivering the highest standard of patient care

The story so far

We conducted an extensive programme of engagement and listening to ensure that doctors, educators, patients and NHS leaders had the opportunity to describe what works well about medical training and what needs to improve to meet the needs of both resident doctors and our patients. This has included national listening events, focus groups and roundtables, regional engagement events and a national call for evidence.

We’re grateful to everyone who has participated.

Since we launched the review:

• over 8,000 people have shared their views – including more than 6,000 resident doctors and medical students
• more than 240 specialty, specialist and locally employed doctors joined our national listening events to share their views on how we can improve medical training
• multiple regional engagement forums gathered feedback from doctors, educators and system stakeholders
• we hosted 23 national focus groups which gathered feedback and input from a wide range of doctors from different backgrounds, patients, both primary and secondary care stakeholders, multi-professional colleagues, charities and royal colleges
• an event for system leaders and providers was held to gather specific input

We have now published the phase 1 diagnostic report, which lays out the current situation and identifies 11 recommendations, including 4 key priorities needed to modernise medical training:

1. Training must become more flexible
2. We must build on excellence beyond formal training routes
3. Current training bottlenecks are damaging and must be addressed
4. We need to rebuild inclusive team structures where doctors at every stage of training feel valued

The report makes clear there are risks to major changes to training, but that the gap between what is needed and the current system is large enough that it is justified. The report also acknowledges that there are some trade-offs between different aims, and that these need to be addressed honestly by all.

The next phase of the review will involve the medical royal colleges, postgraduate deans, the General Medical Council, NHS England and the Department of Health and Social Care as well as patient groups working together with doctors from all stages of training to design a package of reform.

See also:

• News item: NHS England » England’s leading doctors set out medical training recommendations